Neil Burger will direct Uncharted

July 7, 2011 - By Jack

Neil Burger, director of this year’s Limitless, starring Bradley Cooper, is in negotiations to direct Uncharted, based on the PS3 game franchise. Until May, the film was (notoriously) going to be directed by David O. Russell, whose comments on the project caused quite a bit of uproar from fans.

We don’t know if Mark Wahlberg is still set to play Nathan Drake, but I guess most people will hope not (I personally thought he was a pretty bad choice for the character). I know Nathan Fillion’s name is thrown around a lot in relation to Uncharted, but having re-watched Firefly and Serenity in the past couple of months…he’d be great. A tiny bit too old maybe, but great.

Russell’s take was also going to involve Robert de Niro, who also starred in Limitless. While I wouldn’t like to see Wahlberg stick, I’d be very interested in de Niro’s continued involvement.

I haven’t seen Limitless, but Burger’s previous 2006 film The Illusionist was a very enjoyable, period magician film. Can’t really say what I think he’d bring to an Uncharted movie though, but as with every development made in Hollywood, I might just take the position of “cautiously optimistic.”

And, thinking about it, Bradley Cooper wouldn’t be a bad choice for Nathan Drake, if Burger chose to reteam with the actor.

The Uncharted games lend themselves to the big screen incredibly well – there are lots of explosive action sequences (particularly in Uncharted 2, which is probably my favourite PS3 game) which would look great in live-action, and Indiana Jones-esque plots which are really fun. But the casting needs to be spot-on.